A soft-boiled egg.


i just ate a soft-boiled egg like a real British person. 

sort of.

in today's Sunday Times (London Times, not New York, of course) i read a little column written by British actress Emma Thompson.  in it she spoke ever-so-reverently about the eating of a soft-boiled egg.

i have seen a lot of egg cups around the shops in England and i've wondered:  why do British people eat partially-cooked eggs in tiny cups directly out of the eggshell using little spoons when it's so much easier to scramble, fry or hard-boil and peel an egg?

i asked my British partner to make me one -- he obliged.

we do not own "egg cups" so we had to sort-of balance the just-boiled eggs in small ramekins.  i was told to tap the edges of the egg all around until i could lift the top of the eggshell off like a lid.

this was every bit as hard as it sounds. 

trying to hold the hot egg in place burned my fingertips.  also, tapping an eggshell with the edge of a spoon all around the top edge, so as to crack off a perfect little lid isn't as easy as British people make it look.  my eggshell sort-of crumbled under the pressure of me smacking it, but i did get an opening in the top.  partial success. 

trying to scoop the egg white out from inside the shell left me a bit concerned that my next bite would have a fragment of shell in it, or worse, that i was wasting the precious egg by not scraping enough of the egg white out properly with my spoon. 

it seemed like a lot of trouble just to eat one egg.

the deal was that i would be made a soft-boiled egg if i promised to blog about it.  so this is my blog. 

the egg DOES taste yummy when runny and eaten with a spoon.  yes, indeed. 

is it worth all the effort involved in actually getting the egg out of (or off of) the shell?

i'm not convinced.

but hey -- i'm trying.

Eggbama
8/3/2008 01:40:52 am

Here's the recipe:

Take 1 egg, 1 pan of cold water
Add the egg to the pan.
Set on the stove until the water starts to simmer.
Time for four more minutes of simmering.
Take out of the pan and go enjoy.

Reply
Sarita Naegel
8/8/2008 08:37:45 am

Oh my dear, I collect egg cups here in Cincinnati, and they are all from Villeroy & Boch! I suggest you buy two as they are not that expensive..and cute too!! It takes practice my dear, keep practicing and you'll be an expert in tapping that egg..You will catch the technique...I learned to do this in Germany as their breakfasts served made me ill. The only other choice was soft boiled eggs in a cup.

Reply
8/9/2008 07:19:26 am

I used to get them once in awhile when out on the road in the better restaurants that didn't have egg's benedict. I usually ended up with more shell in my mouth than egg! Most of the time I put it on toast and gave up trying to crack the shell.

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